Minutes of November 12, 2003

TOWN OF DRYDEN

TOWN BOARD MEETING
NOVEMBER 12, 2003

Present: Supv Mark Varvayanis, Cl Charles Hatfield, Cl Stephen Stelick, Jr., Cl Christopher Michaels

Absent: Cl Deborah Grantham

Elected Officials: Bambi L. Hollenbeck, Town Clerk

Jack Bush, Highway Superintendent

Other Town Staff: Henry Slater, Zoning Officer

Mahlon R. Perkins, Town Attorney

Debbie Gross, Environmental Planner

Supv Varvayanis opened the meeting at 7:05 p.m. Board members and audience participated in the pledge of allegiance.

CITIZENS PRIVILEGE

Dan Karig, Chairman of the Conservation Advisory Council (CAC), said that the CAC was requesting that it be converted to a Conservation Board (CB) and given responsibility for SEQR Type I actions. He explained that the way the State law flows, after the CAC had prepared an open space inventory and it was accepted, they could become a Conservation Board. He said more importantly the CAC is an advisory board and the CB would also be an advisory board. The Conservation Board does not have the power to enact laws. They can recommend, but be over-ruled by the Town Board. He said what is important is the quality of their advice, and that advice depends on the quality of the people on the board. Unless a group has some prestige it will not attract quality people, and they have had problems filling the positions on the CAC. They currently have a good group consisting of experts in agriculture and natural resources and physical resources, but eventually those people will have to be replaced.

If the board has the responsibility of the SEQR Type I actions, it will take that burden from the Town Board, though the Town Board would have ultimate authority. He said Debbie Gross, the Environmental Planner, has a good understanding of the legal aspects, and the CAC understands the technical aspects. He said one reason they don’t want to do more than the Type I SEQR matters is that they aren’t ready for that yet. They have done the open space inventory, but it is only a data source, and before they can work at all levels and be proactive is prioritize the land uses in the town. He said the charge to the Conservation Board should be to help the Planning Board in generating the comprehensive plan and prioritize the land use plan. Once the prioritization is complete, they will be ready to really look at land use in the Town of Dryden.

The CB would be willing to advise on matters other than SEQR Type I actions if they were asked and if they were capable. They would also request that applicants for SEQR Type I actions to meet with the CB before they put in a formal application and spent any money or much time to go over the background conservation aspects (drainage, etc) and D Karig said that would be an efficient way to save the applicants money and catch problems early.

Cl Hatfield said that most open space is agriculture land and farmers may be concerned that they won’t be able to sell a parcel of land if they desire for development. Nancy Munkenbeck said that was what the prioritization would accomplish and hopefully it would be worked out while discussing the issues with the people who would be impacted. She is also a farmer and sees her role as watching out for the farmers and keeping an eye on things like that. Supv Varvayanis said to keep in mind this was an advisory board and they would not be able to say no. D Karig said they would point out where the best agricultural lands are in the Town, the quality of soil, etc. N Munkenbeck said she expected they would interact with the County group that has been working on buying the development rights of agricultural land. Cl Hatfield said he did not want to create something that would make things difficult for farmers in the future.

ZO Slater said he had reviewed what the CAC was proposing and thought they would probably be beneficial in reviewing Type I SEQR projects. The issues discussed a few months ago the massive work that would have been put on the CAC has been reduced by this suggestion, but they would still be available to assist with reviewing large projects. The work has been scaled back to a level that they can handle, and he supports the change.

Atty Perkins said he wanted to take a closer look at the SEQR regulations and he wasn’t sure how the CB review would fit in with the Town Board’s review. He said there is certainly a place for them to act as an advisory board in SEQR actions where referred to them, that it should not necessarily be that all Type I actions go to the CB. He cautioned we would need to be careful in observing the time limits that are set forth in the regulations, and would have to take a look at how that would work. D Gross said she did not believe the CB should be responsible for SEQR, but provide input, do research and assist in the decision making. Milo Richmond said they have discussed the time lines involved and agreed as a group that they would modify their meeting times as necessary to accommodate deadlines.

ZO Slater said that there have been two incidents in the Town that were Type I actions, but there are other matters, such as larger subdivisions, where their assistance would be helpful.

Craig Schutt said the group has spent a lot of time thinking about this and what they really could handle to start with and what was reasonable. They would like to begin work on the prioritization as well as assisting with review of the Type I actions. He also shares the same concerns as Cl Hatfield and does not want to do something that is detrimental to agriculture. He said that some things that have been done in the Town of Ithaca recently he feels are detrimental to the farmer, and he would never support those types of proposals.

Cl Michaels asked if there was anything the Town could provide to applicants in advance of review by the CB and suggested there might be a something that could be added to the website. He said that for projects that might not come under the purview of the CB, they might have information that would be useful to someone constructing a single family home (runoff, etc). N Munkenbeck said they might be able to come up with some sort of checklist of things for consideration. Cl Michaels asked them to come up with some sort of recommendations for applicants. C Schutt said he thought that was an excellent idea, because in his job he is often dealing with these things after the construction has been done.

Cl Michaels said he believed there was generally board-wide support for this conversion, but he is concerned with adding time to someone’s construction schedule. Supv Varvayanis said the way it is written now, that would not be a problem, that SEQR provides guidelines. Atty Perkins will draft a local law that incorporates these ideas.

COUNTY BRIEFING

Mike Lane said they have been consumed by budget issues, cuts to services and increases in taxes. He said he has supported most cuts, including cuts in Alternatives to Incarceration (and would go deeper there), Human Rights Agency, Public Works Department, Health Department, Youth Services, Mental Health, and others because he felt they all needed to be cut whether we liked it or not. They have held a third public forum on the budget, with 50 or 60 people in attendance. There were many people interested in preserving services and many in seeing the tax rate go down. He said no one will be happy.

M Lane said he would like to say something about the recent debate in the newspaper about the Alternatives to Incarceration. He thinks the District Attorney was incorrect in his attack and the way he has been going after this, especially praising it as some kind of championship for cutting taxes when it was the District Attorney’s office that came to the County four or five years ago and wanted to take over the prosecution of City misdemeanor cases. At that time there was no money for it, as there wasn’t last year, and M Lane said he doesn’t remember the District Attorney being concerned about the tax rate at that point. He said he has been interested in finding out how well the drug courts are working and they seem to be doing what they are supposed to be doing. M Lane distributed copies of an email he had received regarding a New York Times article having to do with a study done by the New York State Court system as to the effectiveness of ATI programs across the state, particularly drug courts and whether they actually are saving money and whether they are more effective in deterring people from falling back and committing drug crimes. It indicates they have been very successful and have deterred more people than jail has deterred with respect to recidivism in drug crimes.

M Lane said he is concerned about cuts in the Public Works Department, particularly those having to do with bridges. Peter Messmer has been working very hard at trying to keep that program going at reduced costs and feels that presently the bridges are in relatively good shape compared to the condition of some of the County’s highways and that more money should be placed on the county’s highways than bridges. M Lane said that while that may work for a couple of years, there was no over target money approved this year for bridges and he is fearful that things may happen to move the County back to where it was ten years ago when there were six bridges closed in the County. The bridges have been improved to the point that very soon the Lounsberry Road bridge will be opened (the last of those that were closed). There is money in the base budget for some bridge repairs, but not much bridge work will be done in the next year or two.

Martha Robertson said she is on the committee that is looking at the expansion and renovation of the new jail. Recent reports have reduced the original target capacity (196) by 7% because of the ATI programs. The consultants felt they had already been successful at keeping numbers down and she feels they will be more successful in the future. She said they are not only keeping people out of jail in a current year, but if you actually change someone’s life then that person is not in and out of jail constantly and preying on other people. To correct information reported by the District Attorney she said the cost of the ATI programs is not 1.2 million as he said (he was adding in other programs that are not ATI programs). The actual cost for the drug courts and the justice center is $731,000 and if you look at just the drug courts it is less than half a million.

Cl Michaels asked how much the 7% reduction would save in terms of the jail. M Robertson responded the Commission of Corrections has the authority to tell the County how many cells it must build. The County is right now planning for 104 beds. That would allow them to operate without the variances they have been using for a number of years. They have an extension of the variance until March 24 at which time County staff will meet with officials in Albany to discuss the progress made on the design. She said the State has signaled they might not be comfortable with 104 beds and insist that they plan for a greater amount. They are planning certain things like laundry, kitchen facilities and program space (the chassis, or basic functions of the jail) for about 200 prisoners. It can be scaled back in the design. The plans to be presented in March will be for 104 beds, but the eventual planning capacity could grow to absorb a larger number. If needed, they could add more cells. She said in going through the process, the consultants are very serious about holding costs down, but they understand they have to satisfy the Commission of Corrections. With respect to how much difference the 7% will make, that is not really a question they can answer, but what their evaluation shows is that there is confidence that the programs are working and they are worth it. Even if they have a jail of 104 beds, they don’t have to fill it and there will be savings if less than all the units are open. If they have excess space they can board prisoners from other Counties and have an income on it. She said it is not her preference at all to build a new jail or expand the jail, but it is one more place where they have no choice. She said the consultants are people whose job it is to build jails and even they say that the ATI programs are helping and keeping the population down.

M Robertson said she also wanted to touch on the highway issues. The state and federal aid that was available for this purpose may not be there in the future at the level it has in the past. The group “Pushback” met with Senator Nizzolio on Monday, and he said he doesn’t think the formula will go away all together, but there may be less money. That revenue source provides millions of dollars to the community. The formula for a County project right now is 80% federal, 15% state and 5% local for big reconstruction projects. This may be another place where they have to choose to fund something with more local cost.

There will be a conference this weekend about state funding. The non-partisan group “Pushback” has identified that all together New York State taxes are the highest in the country, and of that local taxes are higher than average, but it is because of state decisions. New York is one of only two states in which the localities pay anything for Medicaid. Because the State isn’t paying the full cost of it, they have less pressure to rein their costs in. Pushback is meeting November 20 from 7 to 9 p.m. at the Ithaca Town Hall, and everyone is invited to attend.

Supv Varvayanis said he thought what Cl Michaels was driving at was 7% of the 196 beds M Robertson was talking about in 20 years was 14 beds and ATI is seven hundred and some thousand dollars. Over 20 years that is 14 million dollars and Cl Michaels would like to see a little more analysis on what that 14 million goes to. 14 beds wouldn’t cover it, but what are the other expenses in savings.

Cl Michaels said it just doesn’t cost justify. She mentions Pushback, but the Town just funded in its 2004 budget in the neighborhood of $12,000 to $14,000 that the County cut from our senior citizens and youth. What is going to keep more people out of jail? Giving youth something to do other than drugs, or people that are repeat offenders. “We’ll help our seniors, but you’ve got to get convicted five or six times of drug trafficking and then we’ll pay for you to go bowling. On this issue I think the County Board is so out of touch with everybody I talk to about this issue as to where we would like to see our tax dollars go. $100 to a youth program seems to make more of a difference than hundreds of thousands to other things.”

M Robertson said she agrees that the continuum of taking care of people and keeping them out of jail begins with youth programs, but the benefits of the drug courts are far beyond whether someone is actually in jail or not. There is a study on the last two years and they are finding that the people who graduate from the drug courts are more likely to get jobs, go back to school, get off of public assistance for good, and that is big money. They are far more likely to actually support their kids and turn into tax paying citizens rather than a burden on society. She said the programs aren’t perfect and they will keep working on them and use those evaluations and tweak the programs and try to improve them. She said if the District Attorney cooperated more, the programs would be more effective. The judges are committed and the staff is committed to work as best they can, even with his recalcitrance. She is convinced they are worth the investment, and said if you went to a drug court session, especially a graduation you would see something difference. This is the only way to change people. It is not a matter of it costs X or someone is in jail. If someone goes to jail they are not cured and don’t change their behavior. 70% is the typical recidivism rate for drugs or alcohol, and drug courts receive less than 30% recidivism. That means those people are no longer in the system and are not a threat to public safety.

Cl Michaels said he also understands the people selected and given the option for drug court are also very statistically likely to come out 30% who wouldn’t have been recidivism whether they went to jail or not and he still has yet to see anything that even comes close to having the lines cross on costs versus savings in these programs. He finds it a question of priority. He isn’t saying it isn’t a worthwhile program, but what are you going to fund first? Is it our youth who are going to have to scrounge around for money or repeat offenders in the criminal system. What he is reacting to is that she gave the board a flyer about Pushback having last year thrown back at the Town Board all sorts of programs to fund, and he thinks the reason the County did that is because they knew the Town would fund it because the County knows where the Town’s priorities are. If the County had asked the Town to fund the ATI program they wouldn’t have gotten a dollar.

M Robertson said County legislators met with Town officials last week and asked what their priorities were and for suggestions on how to save money. They did come up with some ideas of how to cooperate and things to look at. The message from the Towns came back strongly that the Towns want the County to cut taxes. She said the $10,000 to the Town of Dryden was a reimbursement in lieu of the sales tax agreement reached with the City. It was originally set up to reimburse the Towns for programs they already funded; it was not new money. Cl Michaels said the reality was the County was providing funding for the programs, the Towns clearly identified what programs they were going to continue to fund, and the County got that information and used it to determine its own cuts and slash programs that other people were going to fund. The County is pushing back itself and he said it is putting the wrong things first as far as priorities for a County Legislature.

M Robertson said at public forums the County has held on the budget, more people have spoken in favor of programs that people have spoken against increasing the tax rate. She said they have cut every single department and the programs they have tried to save are the ones that they are convinced save money in the short and long runs. Pushback is a response to that and they are trying to encourage legislators in the higher levels of government to take this seriously and take responsibility for their own programs. She is not crazy about the $10,000 they cut and the legislature has not had a chance to discuss it because it “got lost in the shuffle” but it is something that may come up at their next meeting.

Cl Hatfield asked how many graduates they had each year and M Robertson said that since 2000 in felony drug court 53% have either graduated or are still in the program of 215 participants. Cl Stelick said most of the participants were City of Ithaca residents and M Robertson said the report published was not really accurate because zip codes were used as the basis for determining residence. Cl Stelick said that amounts to $150,000 per graduate spent on that program. M Robertson said jail fails, it doesn’t work. Cl Stelick said it is obvious AIT fails too, and asked how much was cut from the ATI budget this year. She responded about $100,000.

Cl Stelick asked how much was cut from the Recreation Partnership. M Robertson said they funded $38,110 at 80% of last year’s level. When asked what the plans for the future were with respect to the Rec Partnership, she said she had asked Cathy Valentino about the Rec Partnership. C Valentino said that if the County cut its funding, the Town’s could deal with the $38,000, so M Robertson took that back to the County Board. Following that at a Rec Partnership meeting it was clear the other Town’s were not aware of that, and voted to ask the County to reconsider that. M Robertson expects there will be a vote at the County to make that funding ongoing.

Supv Varvayanis said she was misrepresenting somewhat. His position at that meeting was that he wanted to know whether the County was in or out of the partnership next year, because the County has not committed. The Town Supervisors had talked and decided that if they didn’t know the County was in, they were going to assume they were out.

Cl Michaels said the reality was that the Town of Dryden had indicated that if the County didn’t fund it, they would probably find funding for it because the priorities here are for youth programs and senior citizen programs, and he thinks he accurately described what the County did with the information gleaned from that meeting. He doesn’t think the County should set its priorities by cutting what they know other municipalities will fund and funding what they know no one else will support.

M Robertson suggested the Board pass a resolution asking the County to support the Recreation Partnership with ongoing funding and said she would be happy to take that back. Cl Stelick that was nice, but it was obvious when they fund $700,000 for ATI and are knocking back a number of other programs that they have already made up their minds. M Robertson said the Towns and the County have very different responsibilities, and she would like to fund youth programs at 150%, but they have responsibilities that they can’t ignore.

M Robertson said they may be able to lower the tax rate a little, but if they do much more to the budget they are going to lose the eight votes they already have, and if they don’t have a compromise that eight people can agree on then by law it goes back to Steve Whicher’s budget which is 26%. The current proposed increase in the tax rate is 19.65%. She said if you want to look at non-mandated funding, highway is a much larger budget. They could cut the Sheriff way back and rely on the State Police. The only place they have increased staffing is in emergency response. She said she doesn’t know how much more they can do. She hopes they can reduce the rate more.

COUNCIL PRIVILEGE

None.

HIGHWAY DEPARTMENT

Jack Bush provided the board with a proposed resolution designating seasonal limited use highways and asked that they pass it.

RESOLUTION #160 – DESIGNATE SEASONAL LIMITED USE HIGHWAYS

Cl Michaels offered the following resolution and asked for its adoption:

RESOLVED, that this Town Board hereby accepts the following list of seasonal limited use highways upon the recommendation of the Highway Superintendent. These roads will not be plowed or maintained from November 2003 through April 2004. The roads will be posted with the appropriate signs and the Town Clerk shall post such notice at the Town Hall.

2nd Cl Stelick

Roll Call Vote Cl Hatfield Yes

Cl Stelick Yes

Supv Varvayanis Yes

Cl Michaels Yes

ATTORNEY

Atty Perkins submitted to the Board his memorandum and analysis of the second petition for annexation that was filed on October 28. Cl Michaels asked if there was anything prohibitive in the petition, and Atty Perkins said it depended on whether the board was willing to waive the errors and inconsistencies in the petition and go forward with the public hearing. He said it appeared they had inserted the wrong tax map number in paragraph 1, and Atty Perkins has provided a copy of tax map #38.-1-30.12 which matches the survey provided and is assessed to the petitioner. The certification of the assessor refers to #38.-1-30.12 and the description and survey describe that same parcel. The date for the joint hearing with the Village of Dryden is December 18 at 7:00 p.m. at the Village Hall. Any resolution setting a public hearing should make it clear that that board is not waiving any rights to file objections. Objections must be filed at the hearing.

RESOLUTION #161 – SET PUBLIC HEARING FOR ANNEXATION

Cl Michaels offered the following resolution and asked for its adoption:

RESOLVED, that this Town Board hereby sets the public hearing in the matter of the Petition for Annexation filed by Konstantinos Katsiroumbas for December 18, 2003, at 7:00 p.m. at the Dryden Village Hall, 16 South Street, Dryden, and the board reserves its right to state any objections at that hearing.

2nd Cl Stelick

Roll Call Vote Cl Hatfield Yes

Cl Stelick Yes

Supv Varvayanis Yes

Cl Michaels Yes

TOWN CLERK

Town Clerk reminded the board there are still minutes to be approved and distributed changes requested by Cl Grantham.

ZONING OFFICER

ZO Slater said he may have a hearing for December 3. Board will have his monthly report in the near future.

DISCUSSION

RESOLUTION #162 – TRANSFER FUNDS

Cl Michaels offered the following resolution and asked for its adoption:

RESOLVED that this Town Board authorizes the transfer of $25,371.00 from A1910.4 (unallocated insurance) to A9010.8 (retirement).

2nd Cl Stelick

Roll Call Vote Cl Hatfield Yes

Cl Stelick Yes

Supv Varvayanis Yes

Cl Michaels Yes

RESOLUTION #163 – ADD DELINQUENT WATER & SEWER BILLS TO 2004 TAX ROLL

Cl Michaels offered the following resolution and asked for its adoption:

RESOLVED, that this Town Board hereby authorizes the addition of the following delinquent water and sewer bills to the 2004 tax roll:

Acct No. Name Parcel Amount

K4353 William Reed 55.-1-15 1,339.38

K5245 Nemcek & Atav 54.-2-9 448.80

K5635 Nicholas Bellisario 54.-1-9.5 193.60

L3446 Christine Carroll 53.-1-7 498.74

L3452 Joseph Giordano 43.-1-19.14 252.91

L3466 Joseoh Giordano 43.-1-19.10 244.19

L3472 Scott & Kristie Lovely 43.-1-12 211.20

L3490 Donald E Snyder II 56.-3-7 182.60

L4025 Ellen Jewett 69.-1-7 183.73

L4027 Vernon Gambrell 69.-2-11 151.07

L5390 Sue Weaver 56.-4-5.31 389.39

L5519 William Spoon 54.-1-13 91.30

L5547 Cathy Vanderbuilt 55.-1-15 91.30

606 Paul & Nancy Conklin 37.-1-10.2 347.01

2nd Cl Stelick

Roll Call Vote Cl Hatfield Yes

Cl Stelick Yes

Supv Varvayanis Yes

Cl Michaels Yes

ZO Slater said that last week the board had put money in next years budget for the Planning Board to do a mailing in connection with the comprehensive plan, but the Planning Board would like to do that this year. Public hearings are scheduled for December 9 at the Varna Community Center, December 11 at the Freeville Fire Station and December 18 at the Dryden Town Hall. ZO Slater has discussed with the postmaster what is needed to activate a postal permit. There is a total fee of $300 for the first class permit and indicia. A check will have to be delivered to the post office to cover that and the cost of postage when the mailing goes to the post office. He asked the Board to authorize a check to be cut for the exact amount due at the time of mailing.

RESOLUTION #164 – AUTHORIZE POSTAL FEES

Cl Michaels offered the following resolution and asked for its adoption:

RESOLVED, that this Town Board hereby approves the expense of up to $2,000 for a postal permit and postage in connection with the Planning Board’s mailing for the comprehensive plan public hearing notification, and the Supervisor is authorized to sign a check for the exact amount due at the time of mailing.

2nd Cl Stelick

Roll Call Vote Cl Hatfield Yes

Cl Stelick Yes

Supv Varvayanis Yes

Cl Michaels Yes

RESOLUTION #165 – APPROVE ABSTRACT #111

Cl Stelick offered the following resolution and asked for its adoption:

RESOLVED, that this Town Board hereby approves Abstract #111, as audited, vouchers #848 through #1007, totaling $451,995.59.

2nd Cl Michaels

Roll Call Vote Cl Hatfield Yes

Cl Stelick Yes

Supv Varvayanis Yes

Cl Michaels Yes

Ambulance reports were distributed to the board members.

On motion made, seconded and unanimously carried, the meeting was adjourned at 8:45 p.m.

Respectfully submitted,

Bambi L. Hollenbeck

Town Clerk